The 2018 Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research goes to Professor Olav Sorenson, Professor Yale School of Management. Sorenson is awarded for showing how entrepreneurial activity and innovation are strongly embedded in socially and spatially bounded relationships. The Global Award is the foremost international award in entrepreneurship research with a prize sum of € 100,000.

Professor Alexander Ljungqvist, affiliated to IFN, has been appointed to the Stefan Persson Family Chair in Entrepreneurial Finance at the Stockholm School of Economics. Ljungqvist has previously in cooperation with several IFN researchers been studying among other things the importance of the stock market for the industry. He most recently held the Ira Rennert Chair in Finance and…

Even if service companies grow rapidly and dominate modern economies, there is barely any knowledge of their productivity. In an article in Ekonomisk Debatt Matilda Orth, IFN, and Florin Maican, affiliated to IFN, present new methods for analyzing productivity in service companies where investment in new technology is key. They have investigated the extent to which supermarket establishments and…

Niclas Berggren, Henrik Jordahl, IFN and Panu Poutvaara are the authors of the study “The right look: Conservative politicians look better and voters reward it” that was recently published in the peer reviewed research magazine Journal of Public Economics. The article is the most downloaded article the last 90 days. It is also the article that has had the largest penetration in social…

Union membership is going down due to changed behavior among workers rather than structural changes on the labor market, explains the Swedish Labour Policy Council (AER) in a new report. "The rate of unionization has sunk with 16 percent", said Lars Calmfors, IFN and chair of AER. The council points to Germany as a warning example. In Germany the unionization has fallen with almost 30…

Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research has a new updated website. The award is unique in its kind with its price sum of a 100 000 euro and a global focus. The award is given by the Swedish Entrepreneurship Forum and the Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN). Vinnova is co-financier and the price sum comes from Stockholms Köpmansklubb.

IFN is seeking two research assistants for two months in the summer of 2018. To a large extent the daily work will entail the day-to-day work of a researcher. The chores varies: compiling literature, compiling data for data bases, or working with STATA, i.e coding for proper analysis of given data. Preferably you should have completed your master in Economics or be at the very end of the master…

Andreas Bergh and Mårten Blix, IFN are two of the authors to the anthology Money for Nothing – Essays on Basic Income (Timbro, 2018) “The welfare state […] is based on the theory that if you can work and support yourself you should do so,” writes Bergh. Mårten Blix, has calculated the cost of introducing a basic income/salary. “If all of Sweden’s…

A guest column in Svenska Dagbladet by Henrik Jordahl has received considerable attention, including an unusually large amount of readers’comments. Most of them writing that they appreciate his critique of the government’s suggestion to introduce a limit on profit in the welfare sector. Henrik Jordahl explains that he wrote the article being “upset with the government that for…

Daniel Waldenström, IFN, chairman of the SNS Economic Policy Council, presented the 2018 Council Report at a seminar January 19. Co-authors have been Åsa Hansson, Associate Professor, Lund University.and Spencer Bastani, Associate Professor, Linnæus University. The Researchers suggest that the tax on income should be lowered but that the tax on capital should be higher. “Our…

Lars Calmfors, IFN, has been appointed by the Norwegian Government to to be part of an expert group to study the labor market. The chairman of the group is Professor Steinar Holden. "Compared with other Nordic countries, Norway has had a rather poor development in terms of employment rates," explains Lars Calmfors. Employment has fallen in recent years, especially among men and youth,…

At the end of last year an articles by Per Hjertstrand, Pehr-Johan Norbäck, Lars Persson, IFN, et al was published at Vox, CEPR's policy portal. The researchers have looked into the fact that most developed economies provide significant subsidies to small businesses. The reason being to encourage innovation. In the Vox-article the researchers argue that while subsidies to reduce entry…

In a new working paper Martin Andersson (affiliated to IFN), Johan P Larsson and Özge Öner (IFN) have studied how self-employment among immigrants from the Middle East is influenced by residency in an ethnic enclave. The researchers show a robust tendency for people to leave non-employment for entrepreneurship if many members of the local diaspora are business owners. Immigrants appear…

Every year IFN arranges a series of seminars open to the public. Topics for these are chosen from IFN's fields of research. During 2017, most of the seminars have been filmed, and four out of six seminars were in English. Having some free time during the holidays? If so, you might be interested in watching one of these recordings.

A second report on integration should probably also be written, said Andreas Bergh, IFN and Lund University, when commenting on the ESO report Inspiration for Integration, by Patrick Joyce, Ratio. The report compares integration policies in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany. Joyce stated that Germany is the country that has been most successful to integrate immigrants in the…

Brussels | Magnus Henrekson, IFN, presented the report Institutional Reform for Innovation and Entrepreneurship: An Agenda for Europe (Project Fires) at a seminar hosted by the Permanent Representation of Sweden to the EU and jointly organized by the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise and IFN. The study calls for more productive entrepreneurship to improve the quality of life of EU citizens, and…

A minor change in market trading rules could save taxpayers billions of dollars. This is the conclusion that Pär Holmberg, IFN, draws from his research in a blog post at LSE Business Review. Holmberg argues that when ties occur at low offer prices, higher priority should be given to sell orders with a large volume. "The cost to implement the new pro-competitive rule would be negligible…

Edward Lazear of Stanford University visited IFN on Wednesday and launched a public seminar. Lazear has studied immigration to the United States, as well as to Sweden, and found that the underlying mechanisms are much the same in both countries. He explained that the success of the new arrivals is more dependent on the rules set by the recipient country than the country from which new arrivals…

Mårten Blix, IFN, explains in a new pod how come that he studies the effects of digitization on public finances. He compares the digitization with electrification and says that the big difference to previous technology leaps is the speed with which the digital reality comes to us. The one who is interested in the development and who keeps up with progress will benefit, he says, explaining…

Has expanding trade between the U.S. and China contributed to the polarization of U.S. politics? Analyzing outcomes from the 2002 and 2010 congressional elections, Kaveh Majlesi, Lund University and affiliated to IFN, along with David Autor, David Dorn and Gordon Hanson have detected an ideological realignment in trade-exposed local labor markets that commences prior to the 2016 U.S. presidential…

Society could save billions of dollars every day if trading in commodities, energy and securities was made more competitive through a minor rule change, according to the new paper “Pro-competitive rationing in multi-unit auctions”, which is to be published in Economic Journal.

Martin Ljunge, researcher at IFN, has been appointed Associate Professor in Economics at Södertörn University. Ljunge graduated from the University of Chicago in 2006. His research field is primarily social economics. One of the questions he seeks to answer in his research is how trust affects the health and well-being of individuals. His latest study is titled "The ‘Healthy…

Radio and podcasts, like television, are becoming more common for for all of us to gain knowledge about research and research results. More and more newspapers make television and radio programs. When the book of Kunskapssynen och pedagogiken (Dialogos 2017) was recently presented, the magazine Axess produced both television and podcasts of an interview with Magnus Henrekson. In addition, Public…

At the age of 40, the likelihood is lower that women than men are CEOs for larger firms. In addition, the women have more rarely management jobs with top wage. Differences in qualifications can't explain this, as female managers are generally more qualified than men. Instead, the differences are explained by the fact that women are lagging behind in their career following the birth of a first…

In their new book, Kunskapssynen och pedagogiken (Educational Perspective and Pedagogy; Diagolos Förlag), Inger Enkvist, Magnus Henrekson, Martin Ingvar and Ingrid Wållgren explain that today's view of knowledge lacks validation in both research and demonstrated experience. At a seminar in Stockholm, three of the authors explained that teacher training and education must focus on…

Magnus Henrekson, IFN, was one of the commentators of the new book Högskola i otakt (University misaligned), authored by Johan Eklund and Lars Pettersson, Entreprenörskapsforum. The authors show how Sweden is increasingly educated, but its labor market is declining. This does not promote economic development. The panel discussed how important students’ choice of study and…

Several IFN researchers have published articles in the latest issue of Ekonomisk Debatt (Economic Debate). Lars Calmfors asks "How effective is the industry's branding?". Niklas Elert, Magnus Henrekson and Mikael Stenkula present research on "Institutional reforms for a more innovative and entrepreneurial Europe" that is part of the EU project Fires. Henrik Jordahl takes on…

On Friday Lars Calmfors, IFN and Chairman of the Swedish Labour Policy Council (AER), took part in a seminar together with Ylva Johansson (S), Minister for Employment and Integration, Mikael Sjöberg, Director General, Arbetsförmedlingen (Employment Services), Anders Forslund, Professor IFAU, and Martin Ådahl, Chief Economist, Center Party. Calmfors opened the seminar with a review…

On Tuesday, IFN, in cooperation with Studentlitteratur (Student Literature), held a seminar called "Is research the antidote to fake news?" Magnus Henrekson, IFN, led a conversation in which Ulf Kristersson, M, explained that the political debate’s detachment from research is a problem. Simultaneously, he said that politicians often listen to what economists have to say. Marika…

On Thursday, KvinnoKapital, a network of women working with asset management, visited IFN and listened to presentations by two IFN researchers. Björn Hinnerich talked about the study "Gender Quotas in the Board Room and Firm Performance: Evidence from a Credible Threat in Sweden". The researchers have concluded that the threat of gender quotas in boards of larger Swedish…

On Wednesday, the autumn's first academic seminar was held at IFN. The institute was visited by Professor Per Pettersson-Lidbom from Stockholm University. He presented the paper "Political Power, Resistance to Technological Change and Economic Development: Evidence from the 19th Century Sweden". The study is authored in cooperation with Björn Tyrefors Hinnerich, IFN, and Erik…

“Globalization and New Technology: Effects on Firms and Workers” was the theme of a conference organized by the Research Institute of Industrial Economics, IFN, on June 15-16, 2017. The conference brought together researchers with the objective to shed light on the effects of globalization and new technology. In total, 16 papers were presented.

I have worked in corporate before but I like this better, said Rachael Ahn about working as a research assistant at IFN during the summer. ”The work here has been challenging but not stressful. In corporate it is the other way around”. Joel Gunnarsson agreed. He applied for the summer job at IFN as a way of finding out what it is like to be a researcher. And what is his conclusion?…

The researchers find in this study that legal recognition of partnership, marriage and adoption rights, as well as an equal age of consent, relate positively to general life satisfaction. Consequently, same-sex marriage and similar reforms come at no “welfare” cost to society at large – if anything, the opposite appears to hold. They further build on previous research showing…

Using the World Management Survey method the researchers analyse management quality in Swedish primary care centres. On average private providers have higher management quality than public ones. Centres with a high overall social deprivation among enrolled patients tend to have higher management quality. Regarding quality of care the researchers find that management quality is positively…

A new study shows that Western Europe is underperforming in all four measures of high-impact Schumpeterian entrepreneurship relative to the U.S. In addition, once the researchers account for Europe’s strong performance in technological innovation, an “entrepreneurship deficit” relative to China and East Asia becomes apparent. This underperformance is missed by most standard…

Daniel Waldenström, IFN, is part of a group of international researchers that have received funding from Norface, New Opportunities for Research Funding Agency Co-operation in Europe, a collaborative partnership of national research funding agencies from 19 European countries. In the project ”Impact of childhood circumstances on individual outcomes over the life-course” the…

In the latest newsletter from IFN two new books are presented: Kunskapssynen och pedagogiken – varför skolan slutade leverera och hur det kan åtgärdas (The notion of knowledge and education – Why the Swedish school ceased to deliver and how it can be restored; Dialogos) by Inger Enkvist, Magnus Henrekson (IFN), Martin Ingvar and Ingrid Wållgren. In the book,…

Soccer players born in the fall are overrepresented as winner of Guldbollen (awarded to the best male Swedish footballer each year), researchers Per Hjertstrand, Pehr-Johan Norbäck and Lars Persson, IFN, show in a new study. Using a skill formation model they show that the reason for this is that players born in the fall must work harder as young to be selected for elite educational programs…

On Sunday Assar Lindbeck, IFN and Stockholm University, received the Global Economy Prize 2017 in the category of economics. The prize is awarded by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. The prize committee consists of former winners, most of whom are also Nobel Laureates. In his price lecture, Lindbeck explained that, yes you can make research on economic issues. And he ended on a most…

June 15-16 IFN is organizing an international two-day academic conference: “Globalization and New Technology: Effects on Firms and Workers”. The conference brings together researchers studying how new technology and globalization affect firms' organizational structure and ownership, as well as different labor market outcomes for workers. Apart from Sweden the participants…

On Friday Lovisa Persson, IFN, participated in a seminar in which Vårdföretagarna launched a booklet, Privat Vårdfakta 2017. She proposed that in the future individual's freedom of choice will increase within the respective welfare sector. For example, you will have a choice between meeting the doctor in person or remotely using new technology. What about the general cap…

Wolf von Laer has received his PhD from King's College London. The title of his disseration is "Patterns of Lawmaking: The Entangled Political Economy of Crises". Wolf von Laer spent two years at IFN, before moving to the US to work with Students For Liberty. He explains that IFN provided a great work environment. During his time in Stockholm von Laer presented parts of this PhD at…

On Tuesday the study Institutional Reform for Innovation and Entrepreneurship: An Agenda for Europe was presented in Stockholm. The study is part of Fires, a research program funded by the European Commission. The seminar was jointly organized by the Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN) and the European Commission’s Representation in Sweden. In a panel Jeanette Andersson, Angel…

Former US President Bill Clinton has described Hernando de Soto as “the world’s most important living economist.” Mr. de Soto visited Sweden in May 2017 to receive the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research. In this pod he takes the listeners into the world where he grew up and tells us why he returned to Peru to start his today renowned think tank the Institute for Liberty…

Hernando de Soto, founder of the think-tank Institute of Liberty and Democracy (ILD), in Lima, Peru, has been awarded the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research 2017. "Five billion people are poor because they are not part of social networks of trust," said Soto when he received the award in Stockholm, Sweden. The award was presented by Minister for Finance Magdalena Andersson.…

Institutional Reform for Innovation and Entrepreneurship: An Agenda for Europe (SpringerBrief in Economics 2017) is the title of a recently published book authored by the IFN researchers Niklas Elert, Magnus Henrekson and Mikael Stenkula. The study was conducted within the framework of the EU project Fires. The authors propose a series of institutional reforms to promote entrepreneurship,…

On Wednesday Ashwini Agrawal, London School of Economics, presented a study at IFN. The question asked in the study is whether mergers can have positive spillover effects on workers. It is often assumed that mergers lead to mass layoffs and other cost-cutting measures. Agrawal and his co-author find that information technology plays a major role in explaining M&A activity. The…

In the latest issue of Ekonomisk Debatt (published by Nationalekonomiska Föreningen; the Swedish Economic Association), Andreas Bergh, IFN, writes about three books by Roland Paulsen, all concerned with working life. In addition, Johanna Rickne, Stockholm University, and affiliated with IFN, is one of the authors of an article on "meritocratic government". Niclas Berggren, IFN and…

Niclas Berggren, Associate Professor and Program Director at IFN, has been elected to the board of the European Public Choice Society. This happened at the annual EPCS conference held in Budapest April 19-22. EPCS is an association of mainly European researchers in political economics/public choice/institutional economics. The organization's purpose is to promote scientific research on the…

Like in all of the Western countires, growth is low in France and, among other things, automation poses challenges for the economy, said Daniel Waldentröm in Ekonomiekot Lördag (Swedish Public Radio). He explained that there are three presidential candidates that have presented more or less serious economic programs in the presidential campaign: Emmanuel Macron, Francois Fillon and…

Andreas Bergh, IFN, is part of a newly appointed commission on the Swedish future collective bargaining model. It is Ledarna (Union representing managers) that has appointed the inquiry. The goal is a more modern, more well-oiled model than today's contractual structure, including a controversy between the Swedish Trade Union Confederation (LO) and the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise about…

On Thursday the EEAG Report 2017 was presented at a seminar in Stockholm. What drives populism, asked Professor Clemens Fuest, CESifo, Munich, at the seminar titled “Economic policy and the rise of populism”. His answer was the large influx of immigrants, but also globalization and people’s perception of losing out. In a panel Professor Fuest was joined by Karolina Ekholm, State…

This week Mark Thurber, Associate Director for Research at the Program on Energy and Sustainable Development at Stanford University, visited IFN. His research includes various aspects of the use of energy sources, which is a hot topic in today’s United States as President Trump has said that he “will put an end to the war on coal”. Thurber explains that “as long as gas…

The article "The right look," by Niclas Berggren, Henrik Jordahl (IFN) and Panu Poutvaara, was during the last 90 days the most downloaded text of all published by the Journal of Public Economics. The researche shows that conservative politicians are better looking and that this might create an overall advantage for conservative parties. "We are both happy for and surprised by the…

On March 22, the 20th edition of the European Perspective, entitled The trust in the EU at a crossroads, was presented in Malmö Börshus. Almost 200 participants had come to listen to panel discussions with the authors of the anthology. Lars Oxelheim, who is affiliated to the IFN, organized the event – which was sponsored by the EU Representation in Stockholm. One of the…

At a seminar in Swedish Parliament Mikael Stenkula, IFN, commented a new report, Marginalskatter och Sveriges konkurrenskraft (Almega) by Anders Ydstedt, Scantech. The author noted that Sweden has the world's highest marginal tax rates. One of the entrepreneurs interviewed for the report said that two thirds of the doctors employed at the medical centers owned by his company, are working…

On Wednesday Margarita Tsoutsoura, University of Chicago, presented a study – “Firm Growth and Labor Reallocation after Exposure of Corrupt Practices”– during an academic seminar at IFN. Coming from Greece, she explained, "I certainly can see the value in good government and fighting corruption". Adding that she wants to better understand how corruption affects…

Hernando de Soto is the 2017 winner of the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research. Mr de Soto received the Award "for developing a new under-standing of the institutions that underpin the informal economy as well as the role of property rights and entrepreneurship in converting the informal economy into the formal sector."

Some 20 Norwegian business executives, who participate in the Executive MBA program at the Business School in Kristiansand, visited IFN on Tuesday. Professor Magnus Henrekson, managing director of IFN, presented the book Understanding Entrepreneurship – Definition, Function, and Policy. Magnus Henrekson defined entrepreneurship as "an individual's ability and willingness to…

In Sweden, in contrast to other countries, the wealth is more evenly distributed thanks to inheritance. This is the gist of an article by Mikael Elinder, Oscar Erixson and Daniel Waldenström, IFN, in the latest issue of Ekonomisk Debatt. "Somewhat surprisingly, we find that inheritance tax increased wealth inequality" the researchers write. In the same issue of Ekonomisk Debatt…

The industrial sector must take the economy in its entirety into account when negotiating wages, said Lars Calmfors, IFN. Calmfors is the chairman of the Swedish Labour Policy Council (AER). At a seminar he presented the AER 2017 annual report. He called for a discussion about the industrial sector’s normative agreement in regards to wages. In addition Calmfors explained that the reform…

The Swedish welfare state is step-by-step heading towards a much worse crisis than in the 1990s, explains Mårten Blix, IFN, in his new book Digitalization, Immigration and the Welfare State (Edward Elgar Publishing). He writes that digital technologies are set to strengthen already existing trends towards job and wage polarization. He points out that the automation in the work place makes it…

Magnus Henrekson, IFN, and Åsa Hansson, Lund University and affiliated to IFN, spoke on Wednesday at a seminar in Swedish Parliament. The Tax Committee had gathered Swedish tax experts to discuss "tax reform 25 years – its history and future." Two former ministers opened the seminar: Erik Åsbrink and Bo Lundgren. Followed by Magnus Henrekson who explained how taxation…

On Thursday January 19, Henrik Jordahl, IFN, presented a report he authored in collaboration with David Sundén: ”Vinstbegränsningar i välfärden” (“Profit caps in the welfare sector”, published by the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise). The report shows the socio-economic impact of introducing the kind of profit caps suggested by Illmar Reepalu in a…

Thursday January 12, Magnus Henrekson was part of a panel discussing how the Swedish education system might move onward following the disclosure of PISA and TIMSS (international assessments of the performance of Swedish students). He explained that competition in the education market requires tests (resulting in grades) being verified by the State or a third party, measuring the knowledge of…

Research questions and focus is constantly changing. But basically the research at IFN is carried out within the framework of five research programs: Economics of Entrepreneurship, Globalization and Corporate Restructuring, Economics of the Service Sector, Economics of Electricity Markets and Economics of Institutions and Culture."IFN is one of Sweden’s leading research…